FET #5 - A Miracle in Progress

Post Transfer!  Headed home for bed rest.

 Today was transfer day!  We made the drive over to Dr. K's office in light traffic and beautiful weather dropping off Lena at Grandma and Grandpa's house along the way.  We had time to eat a light lunch at Panera before we headed over to the office.

We have arrived to meet our babies!

We felt pretty calm about the day all the way up until we got to the waiting room at Dr. K's office.  It was STUFFED full of people! We squeezed in and one by one they were all called back into the office, except us.  Even most of the staff were leaving for lunch break.  For an hour and 15 minutes we tried to keep busy by reading, texting, and playing on our phones.  Anything to pass the time.  We've had a delay in a few of our other transfers and it was usually because there were problems with thawing our embryos.  Naturally, the longer the wait got the more nervous I became that our embryos hadn't survived the thaw.

Passing time in the waiting room...

Then it was our turn.  I literally let out a sigh and told the nurse that I was beginning to worry!  She led us back to our transfer room- the same transfer room where we had FET #1, #3, and #4 - all failed transfers.  We are not superstitious people but I kind of wished we had been given a different room.

Our first glance at our precious babies!

We were in the room only a few minutes when the embryologist came in holding THE piece of paper that I had been waiting to see.  My heart leaped when I saw THREE photos on the paper and I said, "Oh!  I see three photos!".  The embryologist replied, "Yes!  They all survived and all look very good!"  I don't think I can adequately describe the wave of relief, joy, gratitude, and giddy excitement that washed over me in that moment.  The embryologist continued, "I showed Dr. K and suggested we only transfer two embryos but he said everything had been decided and we were putting all three embryos in."  I was relieved to hear that Dr. K was still on board with our plan to transfer all surviving embryos even if they all looked great.  I am thankful for a doctor who listens to his patients and defends their wishes.  I think both the embryologist and Dr. K were taken by surprise in how good  all the embryos looked.  Truthfully I was surprised too considering in three FETs most of our embryos had sustained significant damage from the freeze/thaw process.

Lena's genetic sibling is the embie on the top left.

The embryo from our FSAC set (Lena's genetic sibling) was created over seven years ago in 2006 and had already been thawed as a 2PN embryo, grown out to a blastocyst, and refrozen because it was the lowest quality embryo when we thawed Lena's embryo in 2011.  Since it was already deemed a lower quality embryo and had been through the freeze/thaw process twice it was not expected to survive let alone survive without any damage.  And yet there he/she is...a beautiful looking blastocyst with a nice clump of undamaged cells and round wall.

Our two Snowflakes embryos are on the bottom of the page.

Then there were our Snowflake embryos which were first created in 2008.  We had used the first two embryos from this set of four blasts back in October 2010 for our first FET.  The embryos in this genetic set came from a lab in New York and one of our thawed embryos was very badly damaged from the freeze thaw process and the other look good. Dr. K believed that the other two embryos left (the ones we used in this transfer) were not likely to look very good and if they survived would be either damaged by the freeze/thaw process or be of lower quality.  (Which is why he matched us with Lena's genetic set of embryos after that first failed transfer.)  To everyone's surprise these embryos looked great!  The one on the bottom left is even getting ready to hatch!

Waiting for our babies -and my bladder to fill up!

We were just so excited that all three survived the thaw and it was and extra miracle blessing that they survived without any damage and in fact looked "beautiful".  After I changed and took my Valium the nurse came in to make sure my bladder was full enough so that they could get a clear picture of my uterus.  It wasn't so I had to drink more water.  Dr. K finally came in and we chatted in "small talk" for a few minutes while he prepped everything.  Then he asked us, "You know the three embryos look really, really good.  Are you still comfortable putting all three in?"  Our answer was "Yes!" and the embryologist passed the catheter that held our three embryos to Dr. K through the lab window and in a matter of seconds they were settling into their new home in my womb.

Directly to the left of the really bright white spot is another smaller white line/streak.  Those are our embryos after they were put in my uterus.

Relaxing post transfer while the babies settle in.

After the embryos were transferred I relaxed on the table and took a mini nap.  I had planned to listen to music during this time.  I was going to play my half-marathon playlist so that I could pump up the embryos and get them to fight for life!  Ha ha!  But...the Valium was working so well and I just wanted to sleep.

We saw this little sticky note on the wall while we were waiting.  We were the 12:45 FET that is now crossed out!  All done!

Dr. K said his good-byes.  He said to keep positive thoughts and that he hoped for positive but not too positive results.  I responded, "You sound a little worried!"  and he quickly replied, "I AM worried!".  It was a good feeling to know that he was so happy with the way the embryos looked and how the transfer went that he was concerned about me getting pregnant with twins or triplets.  I am glad that I have been working so hard lately to prepare my body for such a challenge.  I am literally in the best shape of my life.  I am strong, my BMI is close to normal range, and my blood pressure is regularly 107/60.  If all three of our babies stick around I feel good knowing I have done everything I could possibly do to prepare my body for such a challenge.

Ready to be wheeled out.  I wore my snowflake necklace for the transfer.

 If you were to tell me that at the end of this fifth transfer that everyone, including my doctor, is anticipating a multiple pregnancy I would have told you that it would take a miracle.  I don't know if our three precious babies will get to stay with us but I have seen this day the miracle we have all been hoping and praying for already.  This FET was supposed to be our "long shot" our "hail Mary play".  These embryos were supposed to be our lowest quality embryos.  They weren't even supposed to be able to survive being thawed.  And yet here they are, looking beautiful, undamaged, growing strong as God breathed new life into these precious babies.  I am overjoyed.

This was our sunset on the drive home from our transfer.